Things We Lost In The Fire
Reviewer: Lee Griffiths
Issue 103 May 2008
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The Lowdown: When her husband is murdered after intercepting a domestic bicker in the street, Audrey (Berry) invites her deceased husband’s best friend, Jerry (Del Toro), to live with her and the family. Though their relationship is already rocky at best, Audrey and Jerry realise that they need each other to ease their mutual pain.
Review: Is there a face in modern day cinema as strikingly hypnotic as Benicio Del Toro’s? Director Susanne Bier certainly doesn’t think so, as her naturalist slice of melodrama wrings a fine performance out of the Puerto Rican actor in her customary point-and-shoot way. The film is certainly much more of a mesmerising one when Del Toro’s mumbling heroin addict is on-screen, though restrained stints from David Duchovny and John Carroll Lynch provide solid support, leaving Halle Berry to adopt her no make-up guise and deliver a teary-eyed performance similar to her Monster’s Ball turn.
Though generally meandering and kind of morbid – with the non-chronological structure feebly attempting to shake things up – the terrific performances save the soap opera antics from reaching tedium, and there’s certainly an honesty to Bier’s work that doesn’t ever feel like gloom for gloom sake. Expect bigger and better things from the director, a superstar in her native Denmark, and the force behind two movies currently being remade by Hollywood (Open Hearts and Brothers).
The skimpy set of special features don’t exactly offer a lot, with the package practically gasping for a cast audio commentary (sadly, there’s no commentary at all). ‘A Discussion About Things We Lost In the Fire’ featurette basically sees the cast and crew chatting about the production for about 20 minutes, while seven deleted scenes add very little.
FILM: 6 EXTRAS: 4
DVD Info:
US Certificate: R
Starring: Halle Berry, Benicio Del Toro, David Duchovny
Directed By: Susanne Bier, 2007
Distributor: DreamWorks
Audio: Dolby Digital 5.1
Visuals: 16:9 Anamorphic Widescreen
Running Time: 118 mins
Price: £17.99
Special Features:
‘A Discussion About Things We Lost In the Fire’ Featurette
Deleted Scenes
Trailers
Scene Selection
